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Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
Time: 11:22 pm
Time: 11:22 pm
Results for widows
1 results foundAuthor: International Justice Mission Title: Property Grabbing from Ugandan Widows and the Justice System: A Mixed-Methods Assessment in Mukono County, Uganda Summary: Background and Introduction: For a woman or family living in poverty, a house and a small patch of land provide a crucial source of shelter, food and income. But for many, this foundation is not secure. "Property grabbing" is the common phrase used to describe the set of crimes through which vulnerable people are driven from or otherwise lose access to their rightful property through physical force, forgery, fraud, threats, intimidation, property destruction and/or collective pressures. In Uganda, widows and orphans are among the most vulnerable to property grabbing. Following the death of a male head of household, it is common for relatives, community members, authority figures and other opportunists to plunder the property (including the home and its surrounding gardens) that belonged to the deceased or to the couple jointly. Land security is essential to livelihood security for most Ugandans, over 85% of whom live in rural areas where agriculture is the major contributor to their livelihoods. When widows and orphans become victims of property grabbing, they lose not only their homes and personal possessions, but their sources of food and income. As a result, they may become homeless, malnourished, driven further into poverty and vulnerable to further exploitation. While the Ugandan Penal Code and other statutes do not include a specific offense called "property grabbing," the act of stealing a widow's land violates numerous criminal statutes. Although many property grabbing perpetrators attempt to hide behind customary practices of refusing women and children the right to own property, the Constitution and laws of Uganda supersede such traditions, guaranteeing the equality of land and inheritance rights between men and women as well as the equal protection of the civil and criminal law. Unfortunately, property grabbing against women remains entrenched in the sociocultural and gender norms of Uganda, and the Ugandan public justice system has not effectively delivered on the aspirations of protection and security promised by the law of Uganda. The purpose of this study was to document the prevalence and impact of property grabbing among widows in Uganda and the effectiveness of the Ugandan public justice system's response to property grabbing. Specifically, the study assessed: 1) the prevalence of property grabbing among widows and orphans in Mukono County; and 2) the effectiveness of the key duty-holders within the public justice system (Local Councils, police, Administrator General, judiciary and court staff) in providing proper estate administration and an appropriate criminal and civil justice response to cases of property grabbing from widows. Methods: The study team employed three data collection methods: 1. County-wide household prevalence survey: The study team surveyed 1,806 widows in Mukono County (from all villages in half of the randomly selected parishes in all sub-counties of Mukono County). These women were either widowed in Mukono County and still resided there or had moved out of the targeted village (greater than 100km away) after the death of their husband. Enumerators asked women to provide a "story map" of their lives at the beginning of each interview. This narrative helped establish rapport with the enumerator, acted as a data quality assurance measure and provided illuminating detail about their relationships, associated property and land, and lives as a whole. Enumerators then administered a structured questionnaire using mobile data collection. 2. Case file review: The study team reviewed 187 cases closed or completed between 2010 and 2012. In total, reviewers captured data from 68 criminal prosecutions of property grabbing-related case files at Mukono Town Council and Naggalama Police Stations and then followed through, where possible, to the Mukono Chief Magistrate's Court; the team reviewed 119 estate administration case files at the Jinja High Court and Mukono Chief Magistrate's Court and tracked the cases back, where possible, to the Administrator General's Office. 3. Focus group discussions and key informant interviews: The study team conducted stakeholder interviews with women and men in the targeted communities as well as with lawyers, police officers, Local Council: Leaders and court clerks. In total, the team conducted 13 focus groups with a total of 118 respondents, and interviewed 13 individuals holding either positions of authority in the government and/or roles in the criminal justice or estate administration process. Results: This study found that,for many women in Uganda, property grabbing is a common experience following the loss of a husband. Nearly 40% of widows faced an attempt of or actually experienced property grabbing in their lifetime. More than 30% of widows have been victims of property grabbing. In many cases, the widow reported experiencing violent acts that either influenced her decision, or forced her to leave her land or property. These ranged from verbal threats to physical and sexual violence to mass destruction of land or property. Eighteen percent of victims reported a murder attempt on their lives. The county-wide household survey revealed three statistically significant protective factors against property grabbing (p less than or equal to 0.05): marriage formalization, the existence of a will for the husband prior to his death, and land documentation. Four statistically significant risk factors for property grabbing were found as well (p≤0.05): land ownership through kibanja, customary/traditional marriage, presence of co-wives and existence of children from the deceased husband and another woman. All three data collection methods revealed barriers to engagement in the criminal prosecution of property grabbing cases, including widows' and justice system officials' lack of knowledge on the law, widows’ fear of the loss of social support and other repercussions of pursuing justice, a disproportional burden on the widows to obtain justice, and justice system officials' lack of resources and capacity. Barriers to engagement in the estate administration process included widows' lack of awareness of their rights, communities' reinforcement of traditional norms disadvantaging women over laws intended to protect them, and the complexity of the estate administration process. Conclusions and Recommendations: Existing social structures and power relations already place women in a vulnerable position, and the majority of widows interviewed were living with circumstances identified as risk-increasing. Compounding this vulnerability is the fact that widows do not benefit from the potential protective power of their justice system. The estate administration system is a failed endeavor that does not the provide basic clarity into or documentation of women's property rights that could protect them from property grabbers. Even more significantly, the criminal justice system fails to apprehend or convict property grabbing perpetrators, leaving victims reasonably reluctant to engage the public justice system. This atmosphere of impunity is further facilitated by the widespread lack of accurate understanding of Uganda's laws around property grabbing, land ownership, and succession and inheritance-related matters. There are a number of false beliefs and misperceptions among widows, perpetrators and community members that need to be corrected if widows are to be protected from property grabbing. Tailored public education messages should center largely around the rights of women to inherit and own land, the existence of the legal framework and related legal promises to protect these rights, the criminal nature of and related penalties for property grabbing, proper distribution of estate property, and the importance of and procedures for engaging the public justice system in formal estate administration and/or criminal prosecution. In addition to education on general principles, the public - particularly married couples, widows and property grabbing victims - would benefit greatly from service providers who could help them take tangible steps to protect themselves and their families from property grabbers, specifically in the areas of will writing, land documentation, marriage formalization and navigation of the justice system. The sustainability and scalability of public education and direct service delivery efforts ultimately relies on the existence of a properly functioning justice system. Accordingly, any of the above efforts must be coupled with investment in improving the actual service delivery of the justice system institutions that have the legal duty to investigate and prosecute property grabbing crimes and to provide efficient estate administration. In addition to general skills enhancement, the study uncovered a number of specific actions that could be taken to improve the public justice system's ability to restrain and prevent property grabbing, specifically: educate and equip Local Council Leaders on the law and procedure related to criminal reporting, succession and estate administration; prioritize the criminal prosecution of property grabbing cases within the police, prosecution and courts; invest in accurate and complete records; and reduce in transfers of public justice system officials. Details: Washington, DC: International Justice Mission, 2014. 112. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 21, 2019 at: https://www.ijm.org/documents/studies/IJM-Propery-Grabbing-from-Ugandan-Widows-and-the-Justice-System.pdf Year: 2014 Country: Uganda URL: https://www.ijm.org/studies/property-grabbing-from-ugandan-widows-and-the-public-justice-system-response Shelf Number: 156566 Keywords: Conflicts over Land Fear of Crime Land Governance Land Rights Land Security Mixed Methods Orphans Property Grabbing Property Rights Rule of Law Uganda Widows |